Dear Friends,

Believe it or not, this month marks the 50th anniversary of the laying of the cornerstone of Princeton's Engineering Quandrangle.

To celebrate the growth of the Engineering neighborhood in the five subsequent decades, we commissioned a video by Michael E. Wood '08, who I think you will agree captured in beautiful detail the expansion and breadth of the Engineering neighborhood in 2012.

To help continue the EQuad's celebration this year, I have a favor to ask: Please take it upon yourselves to groom, tend, and nourish Princeton Engineering's relatively new presence on Wikipedia. Who is better informed than our alumni to write the history of our school? Please add noteworthy dates, achievements and alumni. For inspiration, check out the photo at the bottom of this newsletter and see if you can identify those laying the EQuad cornerstone!

Turing centennial celebration May 10-12

Princeton is hosting a celebration of one of the University's most illustrious graduates, Alan Mathison Turing *38, the father of computer science. Featured speakers: Google executive Eric Schmidt '76 and eight winners of the Turing Award. Andrew Appel '81, who is the editor of a just-issued first-time publication of Turing's Princeton thesis, narrates the video at left about Turing and his legacy.

Unlocking the mysteries of the embryonic fruitfly

By studying the common fruitfly, Stas Shvartsman's lab in the Genomics Institute is learning how cells signal each other in order to grow from the simple structure of an embryo into a full-grown, complex creature. The lab combines imaging, computational, and genetic approaches in order to develop and experimentally test mathematical models of embryonic development.

Andlinger lab: Science in the service of the planet

The humanistic scale of the new laboratory for the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment reflects the center's goal of "science and technology in the service of the planet." New renderings by Tod Wiliams Billie Tsien Architects reveal lush gardens, large windows, and welcoming pathways.

Between solids and fluids, cool things happen

This video highlights the research lab of Howard A. Stone, Donald R. Dixon '69 and Elizabeth W. Dixon Professor in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. Stone discusses the fundamental research his lab is doing in the area of microfluidics, which involves making devices the size of a human hair and manipulating fluids within them, and also the field of biofilms, where the group's work has yielded surprising results.

Faculty News

Bruce Koel is collaborating with PPPL scientists to study materials that will help make fusion viable...Time magazine reported on competing technologies coming out of the Jeremy Kasdin '85 laboratory that could prove crucial for detecting exoplanets -- earth-like planets beyond the sun's orbit that can support life... The World Economic Forum named Lynn Loo a Young Global Leader... Branko Glisic won top prize at this year's Innovation Forum...

Mung Chiang's paper analyzing the correlation between postings on Twitter ("tweets") and box office revenues for popular movies received wide publicity... Sanjeev Arora received the ACM-Infosys Foundation Award for innovative approaches to solving the unsolvable...The New York Times reported on David Blei teaching computers to find meaning by sifting through "avalanches of words"... Marlan Scully was recognized with the Optical Society's highest award...

Hisashi Kobayashi published a fundamental text on probability and random processes... Warren Powell '77 has a new book on optimal learning techniques that have applications in energy, homeland security, health, sports, transportation science, biomedical research, and biosurveillance... Physics Today highlighted a paper by Chung Law showing that the performance of diesel and rocket engines may be improved by exploiting size differences in droplets...

Kai Li was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering... Thanos Panagiotopoulos and Igancio Rodriguez-Iturbewere elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences... Friends and family of Bradley Dickinsonare establishing a fund in his memory to benefit students in electrical engineering.

Alumni News

Paul Maeder '75 spoke to Boston Innovation about why Washington matters when it comes to raising money for a startup... PEHub featured a Q&A with Steve Papa '94 on Endeca and the 'relentless pursuit of credibility'... Jeff Bezos '86 told Forbes that it is "still Day 1 for the Internet"... Cycling News featured Boo Bicycles founder and professional racer Nick Frey '09... Joel Moxley '02, one of the TR35 in 2011, wrote about "Thinking Big" for Technology Review...

Alex Halderman '03 *09 presented a paper explaining how he and a team of graduate students hacked into a Washington, D.C., school board voting system... The Mercury Newsprofiled Jonathan Mayer '09 for his work as a graduate student at Stanford investigating online privacy... Tom Leighton '78 spoke in March at Technion about "Consistent Hashing, Danny Lewin, and the Creation of Akamai"...

Lisa Jackson *86 gave an address titled "A Laboratory of One's Own" upon the occasion of receiving Princeton's James Madison Medal... Norm Augustine '57 co-chaired an NAS report concluding that a shortage of military engineers could threaten security ... Lance Collins '81 talked to the Cornell Daily Sun about the school's new engineering and technology campus in New York City... The Department of Energy announced that it selected Vorbeck, founded by John Lettow '95, as one of three startup companies for the title of America's Next Top Energy Innovator.

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